Tag Archive
Day 6. No Sun. Lots of Biking.
Distance since last post: 75kmWeather: Cloudy, rainy.Forecast: Bad for the next 3-days. Looks like I’ll have to be careful!Notes: Crashed into a lamppost while I was trying to mount my bike. No damage. Phew! View towards Remagen (two bridge towsers can be seen at base of hill) in terrible weather. No sun, no energy although [...]
Mathematics, sunburn and how 1.2kw of energy gives you 2 hours of computing.
When I did my first tests and calculations about the use of solar power to drive a PC I was quite amazed at the inefficiency of the process and today’s ‘laboratory conditions’ test proves just how much room for improvement there is. It’s thanks to devices like UMPCs that this is project is at all possible [...]
Berta the Blue Bakers Bike
Distance since lost post: 15kmWeather: Clouds thinningNotes: I don’t have much faith in the lead-acid battery. The Li-Ion battery seems to be charging much more reliably. Another day completed and I feel like I’m getting into a better rhythm. Checking emails and RSS on the mobile phone and creating rich journal updates with the Q1b. [...]
Winter is coming.
Distance since last post: 40kmWeather: Mixed, cloudy. Hazy. Warm 20-22 degreesNotes: Feeling really good. No aches. Pushing harder today. Cant stop eating sultanas! The hills on each side of the Rhein are getting bigger! Winter is coming…If you take notice of the geese that is. I saw a flock flying south (following the River perhaps) [...]
A grape day
Location: OppenheimDistance since last post: 68KmWeather: Hot with 50% cloud coverForecast: Heavier cloud tomorrow. Clearing toward Thursday.Notes: Problem with the Lead-acid battery today. It didn’t seem to charge. Will concentrate on loading the Li-Ion battery tomorrow. Due to the cloudy weather I decided to cycle all the way through to the campsite in one stage [...]
Xantrec 300 / Sunlinq portable solar solution
Here’s a solution based on the Sunlinq 25w panel and a Xantrec 300 Plus combo lead-acid battery/inverter. Its very similar to my own solution apart from the fact that this one weighs nearly 10KG!!! A number of blogs seemed to have picked up on this solution today and are quoting 11-12 hours charging time. This figure [...]
Sunlinq 25W and Tekkeon Power bank work well together.
I don’t really understand why I didn’t try this before. Its simple. its recommended and it works. Have I been too focused on flexibility why simplicity could be the answer? I was speaking to Chris from Euro-Line, an importer of consumer solar products and he highlighted a document that I’d already seen. I took another [...]
Solar charging. Lead Acid vs Li-Ion
In a recent comment here, someone asked why the Lead-Acid battery was needed. Its probably not too clear in the video why I use it so I reproduce my answer (which comes from the best of my knowledge!) here. There are two main problems with charging Li-Ion batteries from Solar panels. Firstly, Li-Ion batteries (in [...]
InterSolar 2007. Nothing for Solar-UMPC fans.
It was an early start yesterday. 0445 rise and bus at 0530. 5 hours later after three trains and another bus I arrived at InterSolar 2007 in Freiburg, Germany hoping to find out how I could improve the UMPC Solar kit at Europe’s biggest solar expo. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much there for consumers at all. It was [...]
Video: How to use a solar panel to power your gadgets.
Before I talk about the video I just want to say “where’s the damn weather!” Lesson number one in the Solar-UMPC project is that the weather is chaos and if you live in mid-northern Europe, you can’t rely on it as a source of instant energy. You’ll see how I’ve had to adapt my solution [...]